The Brentwood of my youth was never what I would call bustling.
Oh, sure, the intersection of Willingdon and Lougheed was pretty busy and there was the mall and the Lougheed drive-in theatre. But even with a major intersection and a mall, Brentwood in the 1970s and ‘80s was a relatively sedate area.
Oh how things have changed.
Sparked by the arrival of a SkyTrain station, Brentwood is now one of Burnaby’s four city centres, with a mall expansion, multiple towers that are among the city’s biggest, and a raft of new businesses. The area is even getting its own five-screen movie theatre.
Nope, Brentwood has sure grown up.
Growing up, of course, comes with some problems. Terrible traffic is one of those and Brentwood really struggles during the weekly rush hours – at least before the COVID-19 pandemic. Lougheed Highway is often a parking lot and the intersection with Willingdon is where sanity goes to die.
Now, crime is another issue being dealt with in Brentwood.
The monthly Burnaby RCMP crime bulletin has arrived and it has some revealing things about Brentwood.
The bulletin always include several maps showing where break-and-enters and vehicle-related thefts are taking place. It also includes that heat map that shows the crime hot spots based on recent reports.
The big red spot is usually centered around the Metrotown area - nothing will likely ever topple that as crime central in Burnaby - but Brentwood has now appeared with an equally bright red spot over it.
These crime heats maps are interesting to study month by month. Metrotown will also be in dark red, but you see crime shift to other areas.
Brentwood appears as the second-worst spot in all of Burnaby. There were two other crime maps included in this month’s RCMP bulletin and business break-ins are one major issue. A second is theft from vehicles. That’s not really a surprise. Thieves often jump off at SkyTrain stations and hit a certain area’s array of vehicles. It doesn’t take long to break into a lot of vehicles and steal whatever is just sitting around.
As always, don't leave items in your vehicle or you risk being targeted.
Brentwood is set to grow even more, with more towers around the mall and at the Gilmore SkyTrain station just to the west of the mall. Another block to the southeast of Willingdon and Lougheed is also slated to have multiple residential towers in years to come.
Brentwood is exploding in growth. Sadly, crime is one of those things that grows along with a neighbourhood.
Follow Chris Campbell on Twitter @shinebox44.
